


Heart-Shaped

by QuietLittleVoices



Category: King Falls AM (Podcast)
Genre: F/M, Fluff and Angst, Happy Ending, M/M, Romance, valentines day
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-15
Updated: 2019-02-15
Packaged: 2019-10-28 17:46:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,292
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17791934
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/QuietLittleVoices/pseuds/QuietLittleVoices
Summary: They’ve been dating for almost three months when Valentine’s Day comes around. Sammy’s only really had one boyfriend before, and that was a Summer thing after second year - they hadn’t made it to the major holidays, and Sammy thinks that maybe even if they had this would still be different.Because it’s Jack. And Sammy’s never felt this way about anyone else, can’t even imagining having to experience the intensity of emotion twice. He sometimes still feels like someone’s stolen his lungs when Jack smiles at him.[Or: Sammy, Jack, and Valentine's Day through the years]





	Heart-Shaped

**Author's Note:**

  * For [helloearthlings](https://archiveofourown.org/users/helloearthlings/gifts).



> I wrote this starting when I got home from class and now I have to fall into bed so... enjoy!
> 
> At the end of this I have Jack using some ASL; I'll expand on that HC in the end notes!
> 
> Courtney helloearthlings wanted a Valentines Day fic and had this suggestion, so I wrote it!

They’ve been dating for almost three months when Valentine’s Day comes around. Sammy’s only really had one boyfriend before, and that was a Summer thing after second year - they hadn’t made it to the major holidays, and Sammy thinks that maybe even if they had this would still be different. 

Because it’s Jack. And Sammy’s never felt this way about anyone else, can’t even imagining having to experience the intensity of emotion twice. He sometimes still feels like someone’s stolen his lungs when Jack smiles at him. 

He wishes that he could ask Lily, because she knows Jack and she’s the only other person who knows he’s gay, but he knows that she’d just laugh in his face or make a disgusted noise and leave. There’s only one other person he’d even consider asking, but you can’t just ask your own boyfriend what to do for a surprise. But they weren’t just dating, they’d been friends for over three years, and Jack knew him better than anyone.

“We’re best friends, right?” Sammy asks. He’s in Jack’s bed, because he’s been staying over at Jack and Lily’s apartment so often over the last three months that he might as well pay rent.

Jack looks at him, confused and shifting to look him more squarely in the face. “Yes,” he answers hesitantly. 

“So I’m dating this really great guy,” Sammy starts, and Jack immediately starts to laugh behind him. Sammy reaches over and shoves the side of his face lightly. “Shut up. I’m dating this  _ okay _ guy -”

“Hey!”

“- _ and _ I’ve never had to do Valentine’s Day before,” Sammy continues, “I was wondering. As my  _ best friend _ … what do you think he would like?”

Jack starts to laugh again and Sammy moves to get out of bed, but is stopped by Jack reaching out and grabbing his arm, lightly tugging him back into bed. “I think he’d like anything you did,” Jack answers easily. “It’s the thought that counts, right?”

Sammy feels his face turn down and he settles against Jack’s chest so he doesn’t have to look at him. “But anyone could do something thoughtful. I want to do something  _ special _ .”

Jack wraps his arms around Sammy and holds him tightly. Sammy can feel more than hear when Jack hums to himself. “One of those heart-shaped pizzas. That’ll win him over.”

Sammy rolls his eyes. “You could just say you wanna stay in tomorrow night.”

“Lily already left me a note asking for money to stay at a hotel tonight,” Jack replies. “So we’re gonna have the apartment to ourselves - might as well make the most of it, right?”

“I’m not gonna get you one of those pizzas,” Sammy says evenly.

“ _ Babe _ ,” Jack says, the fake-hurt in his voice undercut by the laughter. “How will this ever last if you can’t provide for me?”

“I’ll let you put on The X-Files even though it’s not romantic in the slightest,” Sammy answers, turning his head to rest the side of his face against Jack’s chest, looking up at him. The angle is awkward but the look that Jack gives him - soft and full of love and  _ too much _ \- is worth it.

“I love you,” Jack says. His voice is so quiet it’s almost breathed, and if Sammy wasn’t so close he might have missed it - but Jack is almost reverent in the way he’s watching Sammy. It isn’t the first time they’ve said it - they said it plenty as friends, and they were pretty quick on the draw as soon as they’d started dating - but it still makes Sammy’s chest fill up with warmth.

“I love you, too,” he answers, voice thick, and thinks  _ I could get used to this. _

He buys them a normal pizza but goes out of his way to find a box of heart-shaped cupcakes, and Jack is delighted.

 

Sammy collapses on the floor of their new living room - in their new  _ house _ \- and groans dramatically.

“C’mon, lazy,” Jack chides, walking over and looming over Sammy. “We need to at least set up the bed.”

“We can sleep on the mattress without the frame tonight,” Sammy argues. 

Jack rolls his eyes. “I have a -”

“Bad back, I know, J,” Sammy finishes, pushing himself up into a sitting position. “It’s not  _ my _ fault you’ve played rugby since you were fourteen.”

“See if I order enough pizza for you,” Jack mutters, pulling out his cell phone and walking to the other room.

Sammy groans as he pushes himself back up to his feet. “ _ Please _ , I’m fading away! Other people get their friends help and buy them pizza.”

Jack looks over his shoulder and raises his eyebrow wordlessly at Sammy, as if to remind him that they didn’t exactly have friends who could be trusted with helping them move into the house they were going to share. Sammy hated when he was so right.

“Fine,” Sammy concedes. “Order food now, though, and we’ll take a break whenever it gets here.”

Jack grins and gives him a quick kiss. “Knew you’d see it my way. Thanks, babe.”

Sammy goes up to the master bedroom and is quickly followed by Jack after he presumably -  _ hopefully _ \- got off the phone with literally any of the take-out places in their new neighbourhood. Jack did most of the heavy lifting, holding the headboard in place while Sammy tried to get the screws in, and they were just shy of attaching the footboard when the doorbell rang.

Jack jumps up and ran to get it with more energy than Sammy had had when they’d woken up in their apartment that morning. He stretches and slowly follows Jack. He finds him in the dining room, where Jack had set out a pizza and a box that looked like it probably had breadsticks on the dining room table. Two of their chairs were pulled from the haphazard grouping they’d been in and were tucked in, and Jack was rustling through the boxes looking for something.

Sammy takes a seat and watches, and before long Jack stands up triumphantly with a large decorative candle. He puts it on the table and lit it with the barbeque lighter. 

“Ambience,” he announces, going to sit next to Sammy and pushing open the lid of the pizza box.

And Sammy starts to laugh. Jack pouts and Sammy just laughs harder. He can feel tears prickling at the corner of his eyes but it’s -

The pizza’s in the shape of a heart.

“ _ Babe _ ,” Sammy says, “I love it.”

Jack grins back at him. “I knew you would.”

 

Sammy hasn’t quit yet. He’s still a person of interest in - 

He doesn’t know why he hasn’t quit. He wants to. He’s missed more days of work than he’s gone to, lately, and he knows that he’s about three seconds from being fired, but it doesn’t fucking matter.

Nothing fucking  _ matters _ when he still doesn’t know where Jack is. 

The police have started to flag in the search, someone’s given him a line of  _ You know, after this long _ \- 

Even Lily’s left again. Because she had a life to get back to. Because she had to keep going.

So Sammy kept - going. 

He didn’t even realize what day it was until he was on his third cup of coffee in the staff room and his eyes finally started to focus again and he realized there were little foil hearts on strings hanging from the ceiling.

The sound he made was somewhere between a sob and a laugh and he was all too relieved that no one was in there to hear him. 

 

Ben is seething about the Valentine’s Dance.

“You know she  _ would _ have gone with you,” Sammy reminds him. 

Ben crosses his arms and pouts. “I know.”

“She  _ wanted _ to go with you,” Sammy says slowly.

Ben just sinks deeper into his chair and Sammy sighs.

“Did you wanna come over and watch stupid movies?” Sammy tries. 

“Maybe later,” Ben says tentatively, suddenly becoming more awkward than upset. “But I, uh - I was gonna go to my mom’s maybe. Or something.”

Sammy stares at him. “Or something?”

Ben shrugs. “Yeah, just - y’know. Something. I don’t know yet. Look - I’ll come over.”

“No, go do your thing,” Sammy says, unconvinced that Ben  _ had _ anything to be doing other than moping but - Sammy understood moping. “Just - don’t do anything stupid, alright?”

Ben rolls his eyes, as if he didn’t do stupid things most days of the week. “I won’t.”

Ben, as Sammy would find out, was lying.

 

Sammy shuts the car off when he pulls over to the side of the road and just - collapses. His shoulders fold in on themselves and shake and shake and -

He hasn’t cried like this, hasn’t  _ let _ himself cry like this, since he’d moved to King Falls.

He hadn’t even said Jack’s name in that long.

He still wouldn’t have if Frickard - _ fucking  _ Frickard, of all people - hadn’t called. Hadn’t said - that. If he hadn’t - 

No other cars have passed and Sammy wonders if that means Ben’s still at the station, if Ben hadn’t followed him - he didn’t want Ben to, didn’t know what he’d say if Ben pulled over next to him.    
He isn’t sure how long it takes but the sky is lighter when he finally takes a deep breath, clears his eyes, and starts the car again.

 

Jack’s been back for just shy of two months, and out of the hospital for six weeks. Sammy hasn’t let him out of his sight for longer than he absolutely had to, with Ben close by at all times also.

He doesn’t even realize what day it is until Ben walks into the kitchen with a heart-shaped box.

“Oh, is that today?” Sammy asks. He notices Jack at the kitchen table turn his head to take notice, but he doesn’t say anything. Jack hasn’t said much since he got back, prefering to observe the new world around him. Sammy has enough stories to fill the silences when he has to.

Ben looks affronted. “Are you not planning anything?”

Sammy looks over at Jack who just shrugs. “Not in particular.”

“Well, I’m gonna go drop this off at the library,” Ben says easily, “and then I’ll probably go grocery shopping so text me if you need anything, and I think I’ll probably stay over at Emily’s tonight if that’s okay?”

He looks so concerned, like he’ll genuinely spend the night with them instead of his girlfriend if Sammy asks, and Sammy knows that he will - knows that Ben won’t even feel bad about it, or like Sammy or Jack is forcing him into anything. He knows that Ben would rather be there if he could help them with anything, though he’d probably invite Emily to come as well. It could be nice, an evening with all four of them, but that wasn’t much different than most evenings.

“We’ll be fine, enjoy yourself,” Sammy assures him.

Ben doesn’t look convinced so he looks at Jack, who shoots him a reassuring smile and a nod. Jack spreads his right hand out flat, splayed fingers, and holds it perpendicular to his chest before tapping his thumb against himself.  _ Fine _ . 

“I’ll be back with the groceries later, at least,” Ben says, before finally leaving. 

Jack turns to Sammy and raises an eyebrow questioningly, turning his head to look at the door and back to Sammy. He doesn’t bother signing anything, because he knows Sammy will get it anyway.  _ What are we doing? _

Sammy shrugs. “I didn’t realize it was Valentine’s Day,” he admits. “Did you wanna do something?” He brings two bowls of soup over to the table, because Jack still can’t always stomach solid food. 

Jack looks thoughtful as he picks up his spoon but doesn’t offer up an answer until he’s about halfway done. He holds up his hand with a mostly closed fist, index finger up and hooked.  _ X _ . He meets Sammy’s eyes and there’s a hint of a smile on his lips.

Sammy sighs, pretending to be put-upon, but - today is a good day. Jack’s left their bedroom, and he’s communicating even if he’s not up to talking today, and he’s smiling at Sammy. He can’t even pretend to be upset and finds himself grinning. “Sure, J.”

When Ben gets back a few hours later, they’re already settled into the couch with The X-Files on.

“Oh so you  _ did _ have plans,” he says, and it’s almost a tease but he sounds genuinely excited about it. “Can I call Emily and all four of us can watch, or -?”

Sammy looks to Jack who just smiles at them. “Yeah, of course,” Sammy answers.

While Ben is calling Emily, Sammy gets up to call and order a few pizzas for them. He settles back in with Jack and Ben curls up on Sammy’s over side to watch. Emily arrived by the end of the episode they had been watching, and the doorbell rang for the pizzas. Emily offered to run and get them at the front door and was back in a few minutes. 

She puts them down on the coffee table in front of them and cuddles up next to Ben, who’s immediately leaning forwards to open a box. He starts to laugh when he sees what’s inside.

“You’re too cute!” he says, reaching in to grab a slice.

Jack looks at him, confused, and leans over to see before he starts to laugh, too. It’s a harsh sound, tight and stuttering, but it makes Sammy light up.

“I love you,” Jack says quietly, his voice breathy and hoarse. 

Sammy grins and leans over to kiss him while Ben  _ aw’ _ s at his side. “I love you, too,” he replies, before turning to open the second heart-shaped pizza.

**Author's Note:**

> Re: Jack and ASL - I had the imagine of him, saved from the void, finding it too tiring emotionally and physically to talk sometimes. Both from physically not having spoken in years, maybe, depending on how the void works, and the trauma? So. Some ASL. I described the signs used as best as I can but let me know if I got it wrong! I'm just learning.


End file.
